Gaza Cease-Fire Takes Hold Amid Celebration, Concern

A cease-fire between Israel and Hamas took hold across the Gaza Strip border on Thursday, the day after Egypt announced a halt to eight days of Israeli-Palestinian bombardments.

The initial calm was met with celebration, relief and skepticism about how long the cease-fire, which halted the worst fighting in four years, would hold up. Meanwhile, the parties to the informal agreement—Hamas, Egypt, and Israel—must now focus on the next phase: discussions over easing the long-standing blockade of Gaza, a key demand of the Palestinian Islamists that could further remake regional dynamics.

Conflict in Gaza Strip, Israel

A wounded woman is treated on the ground as smoke rises from a bus after an explosion in Tel Aviv Nov. 21. Reuters

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, the lead mediator, canceled a trip abroad to an international conference to oversee the implementation of the cease-fire, Israel Radio reported. The Islamist head of state has been credited with reasserting Egypt's traditional role as a regional power by winning the trust of the two bitter enemies—Hamas, ideological offshoot to his Muslim Brotherhood Party, and Israel, a powerful neighbor to the north—to secure a halt in the fighting.

"It remains to be seen to what extent the cease-fire will hold, and to what extent there [is] going to be progress opening up the blockade of Gaza, and, on the other hand, the prevention of weapons into Gaza," said Yossi Alpher, a former Israeli government adviser on peace negotiations. "This could determine whether the cease-fire is short-lived or is more durable."

Israelis and Palestinians awoke to a morning without explosions and sirens and came out of their hiding places, a sharp contrast to the rain of Palestinian rockets into southern Israeli cities and the pummeling of Gaza targets by Israeli aircraft and ships.

The Gaza Strip once again sprang to life on Thursday. With the Israeli gunboats gone, fishermen waded into the Mediterranean. Stores opened their doors and shopkeepers swept up broken glass left in the wake of missile strikes.

ENLARGE

Hamas police officers embrace in Gaza City on Thursday.
Zuma Press

The mood was mixed on the Israeli side of the border. Many reservists called up for a possible ground invasion into Gaza started packing up and going home. Some said in television interviews they were frustrated that they didn't get orders to invade. Residents of the southern Israeli towns that suffered under the rocket fire predicted the cease-fire would collapse.

Despite a reputation as a security hawk, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was praised by the liberal Haaretz newspaper as "sober" in conducting his first military operation as commander in chief, keeping goals modest and recognizing that an all-out ground operation could have risked Israel's ties with Egypt and heavy fatalities on both sides.

Commentators noted that the cease-fire agreement marked a de facto recognition by Mr. Netanyahu of Hamas's rule in Gaza as the least-worst option for Israel—marking a switch from a promise he made years ago to bring down Hamas in Gaza.

With general elections approaching in Israel, it remains to be seen whether he will want to make concessions to Hamas that could be interpreted as boosting its rule.

On Thursday, Israeli government leaders defended the cease-fire to frustrated residents. "I can understand the feelings of the public that have a feeling of missed'' opportunity, said Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman in an interview on Channel 2 TV news.

The sparse list of informal cease-fire understandings calls on both sides to stop attacking each other, though it delayed a deal on a central demand by Hamas for an opening of Gaza's borders and end to Israel's border restrictions. It was unclear how soon those disputes would be resolved.

Though Hamas has declared victory and its regional standing has surged, it sorely needs to win a relaxation of restrictions at Gaza's crossing with Israel and Egypt to show tangible benefits from the fighting, reassuring Gazans that some 170 people—at least half of whom are civilians, according to Palestinian officials—didn't die in vain.

If Hamas fails to deliver results at the negotiating table, it may find it difficult to keep up the united front displayed by Gaza's disparate militant groups, which expressed support for the cease-fire's terms at a news conference Thursday. And if Hamas can't prevent hard-line militants from shooting rockets into Israel, the cease-fire will collapse.

"I'll be impressed if that kind of unity and that kind of discipline remains in the days and weeks ahead," said Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center. "Especially if there aren't other tangible deliverables that come out of this truce."

Israel—which controls Gaza's only commercial crossing to the world—restricts the import of building materials necessary for economic development and blocks the export of goods from Gaza to its main trading partner: Palestinians in the West Bank. Egypt, meanwhile, is wary of opening up a commercial crossing on its border, in part out of concern that responsibility for the impoverished territory will shift from the Jewish state to Cairo. The international community is also concerned that such a development would effectively disconnect the economies of Gaza and the West Bank, which are supposed to be one unit.

The closure on goods has forced Gazans to build a matrix of tunnels under the border, creating a massive market for illicit trade that serves as the main route of weapons into the Strip.

Despite the enmity for Hamas, Mr. Netanyahu might be able grant further incremental relaxations at Israel's border with Gaza that would boost ties with Egypt without losing public support, said Israeli analysts. Mr. Netanyahu has been gradually lifting restrictions for the past two years, so continuing the trend won't be a switch. The concession could be used promote cooperation with the Morsi government and Egyptian security services to shut down smuggling tunnels and block militant movement into Sinai

"We might have created a new architecture of Egypt-Israel common interest," said Cabinet Minister Dan Meridor in a news conference, "that Gaza doesn't again become a source of eruption of bombs and the source of instability."

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